Surgery Partners, Inc. SWOT Analysis / Matrix

Business Essays, Term Papers & Research Papers

SWOT analysis is a vital strategic planning tool that can be used by Surgery Partners, Inc. managers to do a situational analysis of the company . It is a useful technique to analyze the present Strengths (S), Weakness (W), Opportunities (O) & Threats (T) Surgery Partners, Inc. is facing in its current business environment.

The Surgery Partners, Inc. is one of the leading organizatations in its industry. Surgery Partners, Inc. maintains its dominant position in market by critically analyzing and reviewing the SWOT analysis. SWOT analysis an immensenly interactive process and requires effective coordination among various departments within the organization such as – marketing, finance, operations, management information systems and strategic planning.

The SWOT Analysis framework helps an organization to identify the internal strategic factors such as -strengths and weaknesses, & external strategic factors such as - opportunities and threats. It leads to a 2X2 matrix – also known as SWOT Matrix.

The Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Analysis / Matrix enables the managers of the Surgery Partners, Inc. to develop four types of strategies:

SO (strengths-opportunities) Strategies

WO (weaknesses-opportunities) Strategies

ST (strengths-threats) Strategies

WT (weaknesses-threats) Strategies

SWOT Matrix Strategies Objective

The central purpose of SWOT matrix is to identify the strategies that a company can utilize to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Surgery Partners, Inc. strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Surgery Partners, Inc. SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Surgery Partners, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading organizations in its industry, Surgery Partners, Inc. has numerous strengths that enable it to thrive in the market place. These strengths not only help it to protect the market share in existing markets but also help in penetrating new markets. Based on Fern Fort University extensive research – some of the strengths of Surgery Partners, Inc. are –

Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Surgery Partners, Inc. is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.

Superb Performance in New Markets – Surgery Partners, Inc. has built expertise at entering new markets and making success of them. The expansion has helped the organization to build new revenue stream and diversify the economic cycle risk in the markets it operates in.

Strong dealer community – It has built a culture among distributor & dealers where the dealers not only promote company’s products but also invest in training the sales team to explain to the customer how he/she can extract the maximum benefits out of the products.

High level of customer satisfaction – the company with its dedicated customer relationship management department has able to achieve a high level of customer satisfaction among present customers and good brand equity among the potential customers.

Strong Free Cash Flow – Surgery Partners, Inc. has strong free cash flows that provide resources in the hand of the company to expand into new projects.

Automation of activities brought consistency of quality to Surgery Partners, Inc. products and has enabled the company to scale up and scale down based on the demand conditions in the market.

Reliable suppliers – It has a strong base of reliable supplier of raw material thus enabling the company to overcome any supply chain bottlenecks.

Successful track record of integrating complimentary firms through mergers & acquisition. It has successfully integrated number of technology companies in the past few years to streamline its operations and to build a reliable supply chain.

Weakness of Surgery Partners, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Surgery Partners, Inc. can improve upon. Strategy is about making choices and weakness are the areas where a firm can improve using SWOT analysis and build on its competitive advantage and strategic positioning.

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Need more investment in new technologies. Given the scale of expansion and different geographies the company is planning to expand into, Surgery Partners, Inc. needs to put more money in technology to integrate the processes across the board. Right now the investment in technologies is not at par with the vision of the company.

Organization structure is only compatible with present business model thus limiting expansion in adjacent product segments.

Investment in Research and Development is below the fastest growing players in the industry. Even though Surgery Partners, Inc. is spending above the industry average on Research and Development, it has not been able to compete with the leading players in the industry in terms of innovation. It has come across as a mature firm looking forward to bring out products based on tested features in the market.

High attrition rate in work force – compare to other organizations in the industry Surgery Partners, Inc. has a higher attrition rate and have to spend a lot more compare to its competitors on training and development of its employees.

Not highly successful at integrating firms with different work culture. As mentioned earlier even though Surgery Partners, Inc. is successful at integrating small companies it has its share of failure to merge firms that have different work culture.

The marketing of the products left a lot to be desired. Even though the product is a success in terms of sale but its positioning and unique selling proposition is not clearly defined which can lead to the attacks in this segment from the competitors.

There are gaps in the product range sold by the company. This lack of choice can give a new competitor a foothold in the market.

Opportunities for Surgery Partners, Inc. – External Strategic Factors

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New customers from online channel – Over the past few years the company has invested vast sum of money into the online platform. This investment has opened new sales channel for Surgery Partners, Inc.. In the next few years the company can leverage this opportunity by knowing its customer better and serving their needs using big data analytics.

Organization’s core competencies can be a success in similar other products field. A comparative example could be - GE healthcare research helped it in developing better Oil drilling machines.

Government green drive also opens an opportunity for procurement of Surgery Partners, Inc. products by the state as well as federal government contractors.

New trends in the consumer behavior can open up new market for the Surgery Partners, Inc. . It provides a great opportunity for the organization to build new revenue streams and diversify into new product categories too.

Opening up of new markets because of government agreement – the adoption of new technology standard and government free trade agreement has provided Surgery Partners, Inc. an opportunity to enter a new emerging market.

The new taxation policy can significantly impact the way of doing business and can open new opportunity for established players such as Surgery Partners, Inc. to increase its profitability.

Stable free cash flow provides opportunities to invest in adjacent product segments. With more cash in bank the company can invest in new technologies as well as in new products segments. This should open a window of opportunity for Surgery Partners, Inc. in other product categories.

New environmental policies – The new opportunities will create a level playing field for all the players in the industry. It represent a great opportunity for Surgery Partners, Inc. to drive home its advantage in new technology and gain market share in the new product category.

Threats Surgery Partners, Inc. Facing - External Strategic Factors

Liability laws in different countries are different and Surgery Partners, Inc. may be exposed to various liability claims given change in policies in those markets.

Intense competition – Stable profitability has increased the number of players in the industry over last two years which has put downward pressure on not only profitability but also on overall sales.

Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Surgery Partners, Inc.’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.

Rising raw material can pose a threat to the Surgery Partners, Inc. profitability.

Rising pay level especially movements such as $15 an hour and increasing prices in the China can lead to serious pressure on profitability of Surgery Partners, Inc.

Changing consumer buying behavior from online channel could be a threat to the existing physical infrastructure driven supply chain model.

As the company is operating in numerous countries it is exposed to currency fluctuations especially given the volatile political climate in number of markets across the world.

New environment regulations under Paris agreement (2016) could be a threat to certain existing product categories .

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Surgery Partners, Inc.

Although the SWOT analysis is widely used as a strategic planning tool, the analysis does have its share of limitations.

Certain capabilities or factors of an organization can be both a strength and weakness at the same time. This is one of the
major limitations of SWOT analysis
. For example changing environmental regulations can be both a threat to company it can also be an opportunity in a sense that it will enable the company to be on a level playing field or at advantage to competitors if it able to develop the products faster than the competitors.

SWOT does not show how to achieve a competitive advantage, so it must not be an end in itself.

The matrix is only a starting point for a discussion on how proposed strategies could be implemented. It provided an evaluation window but not an implementation plan based on strategic competitiveness of Surgery Partners, Inc.

SWOT is a static assessment - analysis of status quo with few prospective changes. As circumstances, capabilities, threats, and strategies change, the dynamics of a competitive environment may not be revealed in a single matrix.

SWOT analysis may lead the firm to overemphasize a single internal or external factor in formulating strategies. There are interrelationships among the key internal and external factors that SWOT does not reveal that may be important in devising strategies.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Surgery Partners, Inc.

In light of the above mentioned limitations of the SWOT analysis / matrix, corporate managers decided to provide weightage to each internal strength and weakness of the firm. Organizations also assess the likelihood of events taking place in the coming future and how strong their impact could be on company's performance.

This method is called Weighted SWOT analysis. It is better than doing simplistic SWOT analysis because with Weighted SWOT Analysis Surgery Partners, Inc. managers can focus on the most critical factors and discount the non-important one. It also solves the long list problem where organizations ends up making a long list but none of the factors deemed too critical.

Limitation of Weighted SWOT analysis of Surgery Partners, Inc.

This approach also suffers from one major drawback - it focus on individual importance of factor rather than how they are collectively important and impact the business holistically.